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Gritty In Pink: 15 Things You Never Knew About Majin Buu

Pink, squishy and utterly terrifying, the many forms of Majin Buu are truly a force to be reckoned with. Despite his trademark love for sweets and his often childish behavior, Majin Buu was unquestionably the most dangerous and unpredictable foe that Goku and friends had faced in Dragon Ball Z. Where previous threats to Earth usually came in the form of super beings seeking greater power and influence, Buu simply took joy in spreading mayhem and destruction. Having more forms than both Frieza and Cell combined, Buu was truly unlike any other character that came before him.

Series creator Akira Toriyama gave Buu the honor of being the final antagonist of Dragon Ball Z proper, which meant he had some mighty large boots to fill. Couple this with the fact that his “Good” form made a face turn to become a Z Fighter and it should come as no surprise that Buu is a fan favorite. Between his ongoing adventures with Goku and the gang in Dragon Ball Super, the now non-canonical Dragon Ball GT and his numerous appearances in video games and other extended media, a lot has happened to the squishiest Z fighter since Kid Buu’s defeat. Today, we’re going to look across the character’s entire history to give you 15 facts you probably never knew about Majin Buu.

15. HE WASN’T ACTUALLY CREATED BY BIBIDI

Contrary to popular belief, Majin Buu wasn’t actually created by the evil wizard Bibidi. Shin, the East Supreme Kai who first aids the Z fighters during the Buu saga, told Goku and friends that Bibidi was the one who created Buu around 5 million years before the events of Dragon Ball. However, Toriyama has since revealed that Buu is in fact much older.

Existing since “time immemorial,” Buu is an ancient being who has lived in a perpetual cycle of wreaking havoc on the universe before enjoying long periods of hibernation. Bibidi simply found a means of waking the legendary destroyer. After realizing Buu was easier to control following his absorption of the Grand Supreme Kai, Bibidi took his chance to seal Buu away inside of a Sealed Ball until his clone Babidi freed him millions of years later.

14. FRIEZA’S FATHER WAS AFRAID OF HIM

Despite spending a few million years in hibernation before the events of the series, Buu’s reputation as a destroyer of worlds was so wide-spread across the universe that his legend lived on for ages after he was sealed away. In fact, in the 19th Dragon Ball movie, Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection F, we learn that Buu is one of the two beings in the universe that Frieza’s father King Cold feared.

After Sorbet revives Frieza, he informs his former master that Goku has gotten far more powerful since their last fight. When Frieza laughs this off, Sorbet again expresses his doubts by pointing out that Goku was even able to defeat Majin Buu. This revelation finally gets Frieza’s attention, remarking that there were only two warriors his father warned him never to challenge, Beerus, the literal God of Destruction, and Majin Buu.

13. HE’S HAD A FEW NOTABLE DESIGN INCONSISTENCIES

When you consider the fact that Buu has had more forms than almost any other character in the Dragon Ball universe, having a few design errors along the way feels almost inevitable. The most notable example of this is the color of Buu’s eyes. Super Buu’s eyes famously change color from white to red in the anime during his first fight with Gotenks and every appearance in Dragon Ball Z following this battle shows Buu to have red eyes.

However, when Kid Buu made a cameo appearance in GT, he was depicted as having white eyes for the first and only time. Another notable foul up was the Evil Buu card from the Dragon Ball Collectible Card Game, which mistakenly showed the character as being pink instead of grey.

12. IN THE MANGA HE DOESN’T HAVE FINGERS

Speaking of design inconsistencies, another curious change made to Buu’s look came when the character made the jump from Dragon Ball Z‘s manga to the anime. Across every animated iteration of the character (including his many appearances in Dragon Ball video games), Buu is shown to have normal, humanoid hands with black fingernails.

However, Toriyama’s original design for Buu portrays the character as having glove like hands with nothing but a thumb. It’s unclear why the change was made, but fans have speculated this was done so that Buu would have five fingers like every other character, seeing as a similar change was made for Piccolo and the Namekians, who have four fingers in the manga. The change is especially strange though because the Innocent, Good and Evil forms of Buu all retain gloves, but still appear to have fingers underneath them.

11. HE’S ABSORBED MOST OF THE MAIN CAST

The absorption of an enemy is a fairly common ability in the world of Dragon Ball, debuting as early as the Imperfect Cell Saga. That being said, arguably no character is as closely associated with the technique as Majin Buu. Canonically, we only see Buu absorb the Kais, Piccolo, Gotenks, Gohan and Vegito, but thanks to a few what-if stories told in other timelines, he’s absorbed a few more notable characters.

In the spin-off manga Dragon Ball SD, a story following a version of Buu who never met Hercule, aka Mr. Satan, shows Buu absorb Videl, Krillin, Yamcha, Master Roshi and Puar. In the video game Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai – Another Road, we also see an alternate version of the character called Future Super Buu absorb future versions of fellow villains Broly and Cooler.

10. HE IS THE ONLY VILLAIN GOKU KILLED WITH THE SPIRIT BOMB

When you consider its reputation as perhaps the most powerful attack in the Dragon Ball universe, the “Spirit Bomb” has a surprisingly poor track record. Though Goku learned the attack from King Kai all the way back in the Saiyan Saga, it may surprise you to learn that Majin Buu is the only character it’s actually killed.

The attack was famously used against major antagonists like Vegeta and Frieza long before Buu, but they’ve always managed to survive because of some sort of loophole. In Buu’s case, however, Goku uses the Super Spirit Bomb ,which pulls power from living beings willingly sharing their energy rather than the environment. Thanks to significant assists from the other Z Fighters and Good Buu, this significantly more powerful Spirit Bomb is actually able to connect with Kid Buu and disintegrate him.

9. GOOD BUU CREATED A WIFE AFTER READING “GROWN UP” MAGS

In perhaps the strangest entry on this list, the non-canonical story of the MMORPG Dragon Ball Online has Good Buu create himself a wife after reading “grown up” literature. While living with Hercule/Mr. Satan, Buu reads an adult novel called Bob & Margaret and begins to long for companionship. This ultimately leads him to create a mate for himself by splitting into two separate Buus (much like he did when his Good and Evil sides split).

Known as both Titima and Miss Buu, she is shown to have blue skin instead of the trademark pink shared by other Majin. Miss Buu is also shown to be far more slender than her male counterpart and has antenna that look like human hair (due to Buu being inspired by the look of human women).

8. MR. & MISS BUU SPAWNED AN ENTIRE RACE

Sometime after the creation of Miss Buu, the couple starts to long for a child of their own after examining the relationship between Hercule/Mr. Satan and his daughter Videl. After reexamining Bob & Margaret, the couple decide to try creating a child of their own. They do so by tearing off pieces of their bodies and shooting them with their “Love-Love Beam,” resulting in the birth of their first child, Baby Buu.

From there, it is implied that the family continued to grow, eventually leading to the formation of the Majin race seen in the video games Dragon Ball Online, Dragon Ball Xenoverse and Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2. However, every generation of Majin has slightly diminished in power, making them not much stronger than Humans or Namekians on average.

7. HE IS ONE OF THE ONLY VILLAINS TO BE PERMANENTLY DEFEATED

Due to the way that death and resurrection work in the Dragon Ball universe, even characters who die are rarely gone for good. Heroes and villains alike are regularly brought back from the dead with the use of the titular Dragon Balls; however, the evil side of Buu is one of the only characters whose consciousness is actually wiped out of existence after his death.

We’ve already touched on how Buu split into two separate beings when he expelled all of the evil from his body (the “Good Buu” who is still a member of the Z Fighters today and “Evil Buu”). After finally defeating Kid Buu, Goku wishes that he could be reincarnated as a good person so the two could have a rematch someday. This results in the birth of Uub, which means that side of Buu’s personality is forever lost.

6. HE HAS A THEME PARK DEDICATED TO HIM

Though Buu’s “Innocent” form looks just like his “Good” form, we’ve all seen the havoc he was capable of wreaking due to his inability to understand right and wrong. However, even during this point in the character’s history, Buu was prone to commit random acts of kindness to those who treated him well. When he meets a blind boy named Tommy wandering around the mountains, Buu befriends him because (unlike most people) Tommy doesn’t run away in fear.

Buu ultimately uses his healing powers to fix Tommy’s eyes before turning an old man into milk for him to drink (Tommy thankfully didn’t see that part). In Dragon Ball Online it is revealed that Tommy worked hard to become wealthy. To honor Buu, he changed his name to Mister Bii and used his money to open a theme park called Boo World that employs a number of Majin.

5. HE PERMANENTLY FUSED WITH HIS REINCARNATION IN GT

As we touched on earlier, the absorption and fusion techniques seen in Dragon Ball are often heavily associated with Majin Buu for good reason. This aspect of the character was revisited in Dragon Ball GT when we saw Good Buu fuse with the reincarnation of his evil side, the Human boy Uub.

The two fuse to take on Super Baby Vegeta 2, but their fusion stands out as being the only permanent fusion we’ve ever seen where both personalities remained intact. While we never see them unfuse, Buu is shown to be able to communicate with Uub and even take some level of control over his body. After fusing we see Uub’s skin become much lighter, his body becomes far more muscular and he wears an outfit similar to Good Buu.

4. HE CAN TOTALLY LOSE WEIGHT

Though both the “Innocent” and “Good” forms of Buu earned their flabby physique by absorbing the jovial, heavyset Grand Supreme Kai, fans of Dragon Ball Super will know that it’s actually possible for Buu to lose weight! During Super‘s Universe Survival Saga, the 10 most powerful fighters in our universe are forced to fight as a team to ensure our universe’s survival.

After performing admirably in the early rounds of the tournament, Buu returns home to Earth for some extreme training with Hercule/Mr. Satan. When Goku returns to check on his progress he finds that Buu has lost a ton of weight, sporting a physique far more similar to some of his evil counterparts. The two spar for practice and Goku remarks that’s he’s impressed by how much stronger and faster Buu has become.

3. HE HAS A WEIRD KINSHIP WITH AN OBSCURE VILLAIN

For our next entry, we’re going to take a look at the strange relationship Buu has to the movie/video game villain Janemba. First appearing in the movie Dragon Ball Z: Fusion Reborn, Janemba is a demon who has become the living embodiment of evil. Much like Buu, Janemba’s first form is a chubby, child-like monster who later transforms into a slimmer, more fearsome warrior.

However, this small similarity isn’t the only thing they have in common. In Super Janemba’s ending in Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai‘s arcade mode, he and Kid Buu are actually shown to be able to understand one another and eventually become friends. In Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 the pair are also show to be partners in an alternative timeline and use their combined powers to take over hell. Finally, in the 3DS title Dragon Ball Fusions, the two villains are fused using EX-Fusion to become Janembu.

2. HE WAS MODELED AFTER TORIYAMA’S EDITOR

Though he’s since walked this claim back, Toriyama has said in multiple interviews that Buu was inspired by his editor at the time, Fuyuto Takeda. In both Daizenshuu 1 and Daizenshuu 2 (which were encyclopedia style guidebooks about the Dragon Ball universe released in 1995 shortly after the manga’s end) Toriyama was quoted as saying that Buu was modeled after Takeda.

However, when Toriyama was questioned about this in his interview for the 2004 successor to the guide book Dragon Ball Kanzenban Official Guide: Dragon Ball Forever, he denied ever consciously basing villains on his editors. Interestingly enough, Takeda is also credited with giving Buu’s best friend Hercule/Mr. Satan a larger role in the series.

1. HE’S MADE A NUMBER OF CAMEOS IN TORIYAMA’S OTHER WORK

Toriyama will always be best known as the creator of Dragon Ball, but in Japan he was already a big name in the world of manga and has enjoyed a successful career since the series ended in 1995. He may have moved on from the series, but that doesn’t seem to have impacted Toriyama’s love for Majin Buu, seeing as he’s made cameos in a number of his other works.

Before Dragon Ball, Toriyama was known for creating the hit manga Dr. Slump. When the series was adapted to anime in 1997 Goku and Kid Buu made a brief cameo after the last volume of the Dragon Ball manga is placed in Senbei Norimaki’s Reality Machine to bring the characters to life. He later made an appearance in Toriyama’s self-parodying series Neko Majin Z to battle the main character’s rival Usagi Majin. Buu’s character design was also later reused for the main character in Toriyama’s children’s book Toccio the Angel.